Tuesday, July 14, 2015

Eight Jagdtigers with 8.8 cm Pak 43s

Jagdtiger with 8.8 cm Pak 43

The existence of eight Jagdtigers with 8.8 cm Pak 43s is
documented through German documents (see the original Panzer Tracts 9), however
no photographs have been shown of this at this point. Michael Reynolds states
in his book, that 2 Jagdtigers were delivered to 1.SS Pz.Div LAH between 1st
and 8th May in order to replace lost the Tiger II tanks (should be the last 2 to
be delivered at all), but one of them a mechanical breakdown during
delivery-run, the second ran out of gas and was used as a road-blockade.

There is quite a bit of information on these last Jagdtigers
used by the LAH in Patrick Agte's book on Jochen Peiper, at pages 528-9

During this period
the latest version of the Tiger II, the Jagdtiger ("Hunting Tiger"),
was issued to the Leibstandarte's Panzer regiment. This oversized tank
destroyer, with 20cm of frontal armor and its mighty 12.8cm gun, was
practically invincible. There were 70 Hunting Tigers produced. To pick up the
Hunting Tigers, veteran crews from schwere SS-Panzerabteilung 501 were pulled
out of infantry action and sent by truck in the final days of April through
Amstetten to St. Valentin an der Enns.

There were six Hunting Tigers at the
Hermann Goering Works there which, however, were not provided with the 12.8cm
but the 8.8cm gun. The tank destroyers were not yet operational, so that the
crews themselves had to lend a hand. SS-Untersturmfuehrer Waldemar Warnecke,
responsible for getting ammunition for these tank destroyers, was able to take
delivery of sufficient rounds and stow them inside the Hunting TIger. After all
the machine guns, radios and other pieces of equipment were installed and a few
driving exercises carried out, all six Hunting Tigers moved into Panzergruppe
Peiper's operational area. SS-Untersturmfuehrer Warnecke and Hahn drove four
Hunting Tigers on 4 May 1945 through Amstetten and Purgstall into the area of
Schreibbs. The two other Hunting Tigers moved on Federal Highway 8 (Linz-St
Polten) on the following day.

Agte cites an unpublished manuscript written by
SS-Unterscharfuehrer Hans Dorn of the LAH as his source.

Agte also sets out a long report by SS-Sturmann Ernst Kufner
(a radio operator in one of the Hunting Tigers) in which Kufner describes the
events of 7-9 May 1945 including the destruction of his Hunting Tiger by the
crew to make a roadblock to stop pursuing Soviet forces.

Agte goes on (citing Dorn's manuscript):

After Waidhofen,
Jochen Peiper's car headed southwest to Weyer-Markt, where he met SS-Untersturmfuehrer
Warnecke and the four Hunting Tigers providing covering. He ordered him to blow
up the tank destroyers. After they had been driven into an open area, the
Hunting Tigers were blown up and the crews crossed the Enns and went into
captivity on 10 May 1945 at Altenmarkt.

It seems these last Jagdtigers may have been intended for
sPzJAbt 653 but that the LAH grabbed them first, at page 450 of Munch's combat
history of 653 he sets out a report by Unteroffizer Horst Theis, which includes
this passage:

Sixteen crews were
assembled here and departed for the Nibelungen Works on 30.04.45 to pick up new
guns [ie Jagdtigers] for the "Final Battle". During the night of 6
May 1945 the Americans reached the Enns, the demarcation line with the
Russians. Since the SS had snatched the new Jagdtigers out from under our
noses, we drove to the Alps as a consolidated group on 06.05.45 as we had no
desire to be captured by the Russians.

So it seems like these last six Hunting Tigers with 8.8cm
guns did see active service with LAH, but there is no reference in Agte's book
to them actually seeing combat.

#

Unless we can verify that the manuscript Agte is referring
to was actually written at the time the events happened, and not after the war,
it has no true authority. Unterlüss reports made by the German scientists for
Allied intelligence around 1947 has many errors. The number of Jagdtigers
manufactured is wrong in the text piece, and the fact that this information is
included leads one to believe that the manuscript was written well after the
war, at a time where memories would be far to blurred by post-war books to have
any significance at all.

#

Andrew Devey in his book Jagdtiger The Most Powerful
Armoured Fighting Vehicle of World War II states that only 4 8.8cm vehicles
were completed in April 1945: Wk nrs 305078 - 305081. He also states that none
were issued as there were no optics for the guns and no ammunition available.
Wk nrs 305082 - 305084 had 12.8cm guns while 305085 - 088 with 8.8cm guns
probably were not completed.

#

In the book Tigers in the Mud, Carius mentioned how he was
impressed by the outstanding penetrating capability of that gun when he once
knock out a Sherman after shooting through a house...going at least through 2
bricks walls and after that knocking out the Sherman behind the house!

Carius also had some less than flattering remarks about the
vehicle. He mentions the loss of zeroing once a move was made unless the
external travel lock was engaged. Also the strain of having to point the
vehicle overtaxed the drivetrain.

It is established that the Jagdtiger's weight did strain the
drive train and caused mechanical problems but Carius keeps on whining mostly
about the Jagdtiger not having a traversable turret. He was a very experienced
tanker but not used to commanding assault guns/tank destroyers. That was
actually his first combat engagement in a Jagdtiger so he couldn't have been
certain of the "tank’s” full potential.

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About Me

Mitch Williamson is a technical writer with an
interest in military and naval affairs. He has published articles in
Cross & Cockade International and Wartime magazines. He was
research associate for the Bio-history Cross in the Sky, a book about
Charles 'Moth' Eaton's career, in collaboration with the flier's son,
Dr Charles S. Eaton. He also assisted in picture research for John
Burton's Fortnight of Infamy.
Mitch is now publishing on the WWW various specialist websites combined
with custom website design work.